In the Great Plain, including Hódmezővásárhely, agricultural production has for centuries determined the way of life, family relations and beliefs of a significant part of the people living in the farms. The central and governmental measures of the 1950s brought about fundamental changes which constantly eliminated and then transformed the previously established private property relations.
Forced communalisation and new production methods brought about a major transformation in the living conditions and habits of the population. For the artists who sympathised with them, this was a disturbing contrast to everyday life, in which the traits of the past were combined with unfamiliar elements. It was no longer possible to depict and express them in the painterly descriptive means of the past. The expression of the new elements of reality under realistic conditions also demanded a new artistic task from the painters living in Vásárhely and their fellow thinkers.
Over the course of half a century, their joint work has resulted in the creation of a significant and varied pictorial world of art in Vásárhely. It authentically captures the episodes of the people who live here and their environment, and the transformations in their lives, so that it can provide a reliable picture for the next generation. As a specific national asset, it is certainly worth continuing and developing for the interested public.
Ferenc Hézső